Irish bailout

Some great articles on what can be done about the Irish economic situation. The question I’m asking is why the Irish government doesn’t take some of that advice on board. I would presume that the issue is that they are staggering towards the end of their tenure in a haze without clarity and motivation to take action. And the ECB/IMF is taking full advantage of that.The Footnote On The Irish Bailout Plan comments on the comparison between the way Iceland and Ireland have handled the crisis.

This is nothing less than yet another example that in the great collapsing game of Keynesian fundamentalist’s dilemma, he who defects, defaults and devalues first is the winner. Congratulations Iceland. To everyone else: enjoy the eventual revolutions. They are now inevitable, courtesy of your favorite neighborhood parasite banker.

The full story of Ireland’s economic highs and lows over the past generation will no doubt be examined in many books for years to come. That’s no consolation, however, for people who are voting in a few weeks and who want to know where we are and what we need to do. They want to know which painful hits they should take, and which they shouldn’t. To know what to do next, we need to know how we got here and how bad things are, so this post aims to give a bare-bones outline of how Ireland dug itself into a hole, how deep the hole is and the kind of things we need to do to get back out of the hole.